Jeff Bezos is now the richest man in the world with $90 billion

International Business

Fri, 27 Oct 2017

GDN Online Desk

Jeff Bezos became the richest man in the world Friday morning, after adding nearly $7 billion to his wealth overnight reported CNBC.

With Amazon's share price surging Friday morning after its earnings report, Bezos's wealth shot up to more than $90 billion, according to calculations by CNBC and data from the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That put Bezos past Bill Gates to become the richest man in the world.

Gates also added to his fortune Friday morning with the rise in Microsoft stock after its earnings. But his gain of around $550 million put his fortune at $88.5 billion — not enough to stay ahead of Bezos.

It will be a horse race throughout the day, however. If Microsoft goes up more, or if Amazon slips after the stock starts trading, Bezos could fall back to No. 2.

This isn't Bezos' first time as numero uno. He became the richest man for the first time in July – but his reign only lasted a day. On July 27, Amazon's share price topped $1,050 and Bezos' paper fortune soared past $90 billion. But after Amazon's share price slipped, Bezos fell back to second place behind Gates.

At some point, given Amazon's dominance in so many markets, Bezos is likely to pull further ahead in the race for the richest man. For now, however, the battle is between Microsoft and Amazon.

Just after the market's open, Amazon shares were trading up nearly 10 percent at around $1,067, while Microsoft's stock gained 9 percent to trade just under $86.